Beth huddled with Roger on the boat back to San Francisco, watching Alcatraz Island fade away.

"You didn't even tell them you were leaving," she said.

"We were going to miss the shuttle," Roger said. "I'm still getting updates on my phone - Jonathan Steeples just tweeted the GPS coordinates of his charity well in Ethiopia. Besides, I've been coached by various people trying to improve me that the trend at big parties is to slip out and not bother the hostess."

Beth smiled. "But not at a prospective member party!" she said. "It was a test!"

Roger laughed. "Oh, well, I guess I'll never be able to claim that I'm fascinating then - but it was worth it." He looked at her. "Now, tell me the truth. What's wrong? I feel like I've been too boring for you lately."

Beth almost laughed at his sweetness. But after Peyton's emergency message - he said in his voice mail that he couldn't go into detail - she knew that something terrible was awaiting her. Peyton had said earlier that he'd learned nothing at Playground Solutions, the registered address of the SUV's owner, though it had given Beth a bad feeling after she'd heard about an abandoned building on Lombard Street. She wished she could escape this sense of dread for even one night.

Roger seemed to be able to do that. He was under a lot of scrutiny at the party, yet he went in and had a good time. There was something boyish about him that really attracted her.

"I'm just worried about some things," she said. It was starting to get too exhausting to hold everything in. "My mother, for one."

"Marjorie," Roger said. "Is she OK?"

"I had to bail her out of jail the other day for disturbing the peace." Beth would not add for "assault"- it just sounded too awful. "She was at a tech protest - a Google bus piñata. I don't know what she was thinking."

Beth decided to quit while she felt she was behind. Licking her lips, she tasted salt from the sea air.

"We can't control our parents," he said. "It isn't your fault."

Roger put his hand over hers. "My dad protests my brand of tech. He says it's frivolous. You'll never be as good as the astronauts - it's tech's highest order. They've got the biggest budgets and flames and most exotic materials. Going to outer space is almost supernatural to people - that's why you've got rich guys like Branson and Bezos wanting to go there, and on the Apple campus it looks like a spaceship is landing in Cupertino. I'll never measure up.

"My dad has never even logged on to 'Midnight.' But if he had a piñata of the Shalimar avatar, you can be sure he'd pummel it."

They were silent for a moment, Beth soothed by the sound of his voice and wishing so much that she could tell him everything. At least talking about Marjorie was a start.

"I think she's in a lot of trouble," Beth said, not sure where this statement would lead, but feeling an opening, secure that he wasn't going to judge her mother, no matter how many bad boyfriends her mother had been through or public disturbances she'd made.

"I'll get my lawyers right on this," he said. "You have better things to worry about - like your lens project."

"No, I couldn't do that," Beth said. "It's really not necessary. I'm going to check out a public defender soon."

Summary: Beth lives with fellow hackers at the A T 101 hostel in the Mission and works secretly as an escort to make ends meet. She enjoys her friendship with Silicon Valley titan Roger Martin and happens to be Roger's online friend, Forever Steffi, though both are unaware that they have a parallel online relationship. Now, she and Roger are about to get even closer as they embark on a ferry to San Francisco.